Tuesday, December 20, 2016

Iran Nuclear Deal: Trump should send Obama’s JCPOA to the Senate

It’s the “dumbest” deal he’s ever seen. On the hustings, that was Donald Trump’s constant refrain about President Obama’s Iran nuclear deal — the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). And given that he pegs NAFTA as the “worst trade deal maybe ever signed anywhere, but certainly ever signed in this country,” that must make the JCPOA pretty, pretty dumb.

That means it would be dumb not to fix it. The president-elect has a golden opportunity to do just that. He need not rip up the agreement. He just needs to do what he committed to do: Restore constitutional order.

Messrs. Trump and Obama deserve kudos for the high-minded manner in which they’ve conducted what appears to be an efficient, cooperative transition — one that defies the rancor of the campaign and the ongoing effort to delegitimize Trump by “the professional left” (that’s the Obama administration’s pejorative for the president’s base). As is appropriate to the continuance of a helpful dialogue between the two men, they have maintained the confidentiality of their conversations. It is no secret, though, that Obama regards the JCPOA as a legacy achievement. He is undoubtedly urging its merits, such as he claims them to be, on his successor.

For his part, Trump has been ambiguous, perhaps strategically so, on how he intends to handle the Iran deal, variously suggesting that he would tear it up, restructure it, or — in a significant departure from the Obama administration — hold the mullahs to its strict letter.

I would propose a different tack: Trump should treat the Iran deal the way it should have been treated all along — as a treaty.